Four separate pieces, that feel cut from the same cloth…from the same
cloudy cloth. Dahinden, a Swiss trombonist, has asked the Klangforum
Wien String Quartet to slowly build ladders, with rungs that slide like
breaths. Ice is melting on the strings, a lot of space is empty between
the bows sliding, your ears have to patiently wait for the notes and
harmonics to align. The glacial pace recalled Gavin Bryar’s “Titanic”
but this is a much colder sliceberg. Evidently he’s inspired by visual
artists’ work and these pieces do come across as four still lives. The
mic’d up light bowing before the sound is almost a study in sonic
brushstrokes? “Mond See” for Inge Dick ends up being the most emotional
and the least austere, but by the time I’ve hit that, the technique of
discrete single note slowscrapes has left me pretty cold. But maybe
being lost in the microntonal is the response Dahinden wants to offer
to us trapped in the macroworld. Serve chilled…